iManage pulls a white rabbit from the hat with new product releases

24Jan2017

Written by Jonathan Watson

This is a big day for iManage. For starters, the company has unveiled iManage Work 10, a new version of its document and email management system. ‘This is the biggest piece of news for iManage in at least 13 years, maybe ever,’ says the company’s chief marketing officer Dan Carmel.

iManage has also enhanced its iManage Cloud services with technologies used by leading Internet firms such as Google, Facebook and Twitter. ‘The cloud services are a substantial rewrite,’ says Carmel. ‘This is a clear leapfrogging of anything else that exists in the market today and plants a very big stake in the ground for the next 10 years.’

Lawyers And Cybersecurity in 2017

16Jan2017

Written by Nicole Black

When it comes to cybersecurity, lawyers often get a bad rap. The industry’s known reticence to embrace new technologies similarly extends to the perception of its general lack of understanding of security issues. And in many cases, the evidence does indicate that lawyers fail to enact necessary cybersecurity measures for any number of reasons.

Common sense dictates that larger law firms would have better cybersecurity procedures in place due to large in-house IT staff and devoted legal IT budgets. But surprisingly, according to the results of the American Bar Association’s latest Legal Technology Survey Report, large law firms are often the most likely to experience security breaches.

2016 Highlights and Trends: A Wrap Up

27Dec2016

Written by Nicole Black

As another year draws to a close, it’s time to take a look backward. In 2016, I wrote about a lot of different legal technology issues, but which ones stood out? What legal technology trends shaped 2016 and will continue to shape the legal profession well into 2017 and beyond?

I started the year off in January discussing one of the most talked about topics of 2016 and then returned to that topic again in June: the effect of AI on the legal profession. Despite the dire predictions of some that robots would soon replace many of the functions that lawyers perform, I concluded that that simply wouldn’t be the case.

The security-related lexicon pertaining to email scams is rapidly growing. There’s phishing, spear-phishing, ransomware, whaling; and most recently, I heard of ‘smishing’. Not entirely an email scam, but these SMS-based messages have an email like format with email-specific fields in the messages and malicious links hiding behind shortened URLs.

Cybercrime is indeed a global problem, but law firms are especially susceptible due to the large volume of highly sensitive client data they hold on businesses and individuals; in addition to the fact that they are also cash rich.

What Lawyers Should Be Thankful For in 2016

22Nov2016

Written by Nicole Black

Thanksgiving is right around the corner for lawyers in the U.S. For many, this time of year is a time to reflect on the positive - to take stock of your life and be thankful for the good things that have come your way. Following a tumultuous election, many are unsure what the future holds. But for me, one constant for which I am grateful is technology and all of the opportunities it provides.

How to make social media work for law firms

17Nov2016

Written by Ben Hollom

In my experience, social media management is probably the main area of customer engagement where law firms fall flat. Admittedly, it’s a tough nut to crack, whichever industry you’re in, but the legal sector seems particularly bad when it comes to implementing effective social media strategies.

In recent years, I’ve come across countless profiles that have been left to stagnate, languishing in the dusty corners of the Web, deemed unworthy of due care and attention because they didn’t deliver retweets and mentions. After all, who’s going to ‘Like’ a lawyer or ‘Share’ a solicitor, right?

Lawyers and Client Communication in 2016

24Oct2016

Written by Nicole Black

Attorney-client confidentiality is the very foundation of relationships between lawyers and their clients. Client trust would be eroded in the absence of this strict obligation of maintaining confidentiality. It is only because clients know that their communications with legal counsel are deemed confidential that they’re able to provide their attorneys with a full description of the underlying facts and issues that lead them to seek assistance in the first place.

The Shifting Role of eDiscovery in the Legal Space

27Sep2016

Written by Jack Berlin & Jason Silva

In the course of only a decade, e-discovery has moved from a costly experiment pursued by only the largest law firms to a near necessity for organizations of all sizes. Today, even small and medium firms are adopting the technology, spurred on by the availability of third-party resources, lower implementation costs, the challenge of preserving digital information, and encouragement from judges. Over the last few years, the scope of e-discovery has spread to criminal proceedings, breaking free of its historical confinement to the civil realm. As e-discovery continues to mature, its capabilities and applications will only continue to expand.

ILTACON 2016: Innovation in Collaboration

12Sep2016

Written by Editor

ILTACON 2016 is a wrap. All in all it was an enjoyable conference, rife with lots of interesting conversation about the intersection of of law and technology. What stood out to me this year was the increasing number of cloud-based software offerings designed to facilitate better collaboration between litigation teams. I first noticed this trend in early 2015.

Using technology to drive profitability in the modern law firm

18Jul2016

Written by James Quinn

Having spent the first part of my career as a corporate solicitor in the magic-circle, I could see first-hand significant inefficiencies within legal practice and the opportunity for technology automation to change the legal landscape forever. It is for this reason that I co‑founded Clarilis with a view to developing and implementing its unique precedent automation platform that is proven to improve the profitability and efficiency of law firms.

Home Invasion!!

14Jul2016

Written by Jeffrey Brandt

I recently came back from ILTA’s fantastic LegalSEC Summit where I learned quite a bit from my colleagues at law firms of all sizes - big and small - as well as a number of amazing vendors. The IT folks in attendance were looking for tips to better influence culture and get a handle on information security. As you might expect, many firms are serious or getting serious about security. But let me tell you, some firms are very, VERY serious about security. At LegalSEC I also had the honor of speaking with Steve Boyce from Microsoft. Our topic was entitled, The Internet of Things Are Lurking. As that information was published I had a number of people reach out to me on the subject of the IoT (Internet of Things).